When did the 16ton Mineral Wagons...
 

When did they generally start to decline in use, and when were they withdrawn or scrapped?

The decline set in after Beeching closed half the railway system and the bottom fell out of railway frieght: late 60's onwards. A complete rake is preserved at the Great Central Railway as a"Windcutter set" I think this was done in the mid 1990's

There was one positive: cutting up the 16 ton wagons slowed down cutting up steam engines at Barry.

At the risk of a slapped-wrist at wandering O/T in only the third post of this thread ;)

Whenever someone mentions Beeching I like to point out that there were two reports:- The first and famous one axed the uneconomic parts of the railway network. Beeching-Part 2 reccomeded investing millions (billions?) of pounds in a modern high-speed intercity railway system. His two reports were meant to be read together.

Funny how the second one got so pointedly ignored by the Goverment(s) of the time. (Because they were pouring all that money into the new Motorways. The roads-lobby is nothing new)

No, Beeching wasnt the problem at all. He got it exactly right.

Fair comment and unfortuntely it has continued ever since: massive under investment while the rest of Europe build up a modern high speed network.

Even the present efforts are well short of the mark!

Loose couple trains were phased out in the mid 1980's.
When I started all the pit trip train loose coupled with a brake van.
BR first did away with hundreds of un fitted vehicle, and converted others from vacuum to air brakes.
Then the brake vans were done away with, and trains went FF to the pits.
These vehicle were MCV's and HTV's.
At this time coal/coke and coalite went on Speedlink trains which at this time were all air braked. The vehicles that went on speedlink were HEA's and they were painted RED.
MGR vehicles were composed of HAA air braked stock

And on wednesday this week I saw at least 6 low loaders on the A1 heading South through North Yorkshire carrying the scrapped remains of HAA wagons.

MCV's were still just in use in the very early 80's. As they were used to carry
spoil from Betteshanger Colliery to Selhurst for the remodelling of the Junction there.
The ED in my avatar has got a raft of them on

I know that they are not 16 ton wagons but I have posted some sad pics of mgr wagons being taken to thier Deaths !! RIP MGR Wagons :(

HAA's had a good run from 1965 to the present day.